


Something Serious and Romantic (Or, alternatively, Rocks Fall and Everyone Dies)

by bhaer, Mad_Max



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Character Death, F/F, F/M, Gen, M/M, Multi, Other, Random Acts of Violence, boulders, excessive fanon characterisations, idolisation, mentions of sticks in places where they probably shouldn't be, mispelled names
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-23
Updated: 2013-07-23
Packaged: 2017-12-21 04:03:03
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,830
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/895553
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bhaer/pseuds/bhaer, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mad_Max/pseuds/Mad_Max
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Enjorlas, fearless leader of a revolutionary group with nothing to revolt against, faces a devastating problem.<br/>(A parody in one act.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Something Serious and Romantic (Or, alternatively, Rocks Fall and Everyone Dies)

Once upon a time, at the ABC Cafe in Paris...

Jehan, who did not have a last name but was perpetually known as Jehan because he was unique and did not follow convention, waltzed into the ABC Cafe clutching wildflowers he had picked on his journey over. His long strawberry side-braid flew in the wind. The wind indoors. There was wind inside the cafe.

Standing on a table inside the café was Enjorlas, who has wild, blond curls and was always speaking Very Loudly about vaguely political things that he never specified when asked.

For example:

“What exactly are we supposed to be protesting this time, Enjy?” asked a red-head in a luridly red-and-white Poland t-shirt. This was Feuilly, who spent a lot of time reading Wikipedia articles about pierogies and Chopin, and wondering how to pronounce his name.

Enjorlas was about to answer with a wave of his hand and a nonchalant, “Oh, you know, the government.... “ when he was distracted by the door banging open. A scruffy but gorgeous hobo in a red beanie stumbled in, six bottles of various liquor filling his hands, the crooks of his elbows and his coat pockets.

Fixing Enjorlas with his tender, beautiful ice blue eyes, he giggled, “Sorry, Apollo! I got held up at my studio. Hadn’t realised how time consuming lying on the floor in the foetal position, drinking my liver into submission and sobbing about the state of my life and my unrequited love for you could be.”

“R, we’re busy, you know, being revolutionaries,” Enjorlas snarled, exposing a row of blindingly white teeth. Grantaire, after being temporarily blinded by the light, sunk onto the ground sobbing about his inadequacies. He was ignored. None of his friends actually liked him. 

“As I was saying,” Enjorlas continued, “GAY RIGHTS. ANTI-GOVERNMENT. CAPITALISM IS SORT OF BAD. Ahem. Thank you very much.” He stepped down from the table while the whole group clapped.

“There’s Enjy, going on another speech,” Courf whispered to Jehan. They were in gay-love. Jehan moved his hand out of Courf’s jeans to gently stroke his face.

“The course of true love never did run smooth,” Jehan said gently, because he was a gentle person.

“What does that have to do with anything?” Combeferre, the smart one, said as he polished his glasses and frowned.

“It’s poetry.”

R, having recovered from his sobbing fit on the floor, slid loose-limbed onto the booth between them. “Here’s poetry:

_Sex is like math_

_You subtract the clothes_

_Add the bed_

_Divide the legs_

_And pray you don’t multiply_.”

He sighed and chugged a bottle of Jack. “Too bad I was never good at math.... 

Sensing the onset of a potential crying fit, Courferyac, who was always incredibly, impossibly, painfully cheerful and as loud as the neon leggings he was wearing, sprang to his feet.

“I know what we should do!” he cried out.

“Not another strip tease, I hope,” sighed Combeferre, wiping his glasses again. His glasses needed to be constantly cleaned.

Courf scoffed. “What do you take me for? Of course not. I never recycle ideas. Here’s what we’ll do - “

At that moment, the door to the café burst open once more, and a monstrosity of a man in a fire-engine red t-shirt that looked about ready to burst beneath the pressure of his tight muscles strode in. “Sorry I’m late, but I’m not really sorry,” he bellowed, picking up the first unlucky soul to cross his path by the scruff of the neck and launching him head-first through the window.

“Sorry, there was a bar brawl on the way in and I had to smash a few windows. You know how it is,” Bahorel said. The floorboards creaked under the weight of his immense muscles. He grabbed a bottle of whiskey from behind the bar and chugged it whole. When the barmaid protested he took her into his arms heterosexually and they kissed.

“We could do that,” Jehan said. Despite his floral skinny jeans and lace shirt, he was very kinky.

“We could sing Beyoncé,” Courferyrac offered. He flexed his legs in anticipation of performing the ‘Single Ladies’ dance.

“Revolution!” Enjorlas cried furiously. He needed to get laid. “France before pants!”

“Are we in France?” Combeferre asked. He reflexively took off his glasses to polish them.

“I thought we were in America.” Jehan had taken out a sharpie and was writing Pablo Nerudo poetry on Courferyrac’s face.

“That would explain the anglicized pronunciation of our names, the American slang and the total lack of French culture besides the occasional brioche,” Combeferre said. He was very smart. That was why he wore glasses.

“Excuse you, I had a croissant this morning,” Courfeyrac said.

“Poland!” Feuilly cried.

“We’re in Hell,” moaned R into his bottle.

A small voice made itself heard above the others:

“I think we are in France,” said Joly hesitantly, re-adjusting the fit of his Hazmat suit - just in case. Joly never went anywhere without his Hazmat suit, bottle of bleach (a necessity when it comes to germ-genocide) and hand sanitizer.

His friends swung around in their seats, shocked; they usually forget about Joly when not laughing over his hypochondriac, compulsively germ-fearing quirks, or asking him to look them over when they’ve been brutalised by the police at a protest-turned-riot.

“I think so, too,” echoes Combeferre, polishing his glasses. “I couldn’t think of any other explanations for our sordid obsession with the tricolor, the phrase ‘liberté, equalité, fraternité’, or the French monarchy - though, the French monarchy thing confuses me still, as I’m fairly certain I read today’s date as Tuesday 23 July, 2013 in my copy of Le Monde.”

“2013? That explains our cell phones and why we all worship Macklemore,” Enjorlas said. “But if it’s 2013, why do I still cite enlightenment era thinkers?”

Bahorel extricated himself from the barmaid, making a squelching sound as their mouths separated. “I hate books! And thinking! When do we FIGHT?”

“But you can get hurt fighting!” Joly called from inside his gargantuan hazmat suit. “Bousset said—”

“Who’s Bousset?” Courferyrac asked.

“I’ve never heard of him,” R said, shrugging over his sketchbook, where he was colouring in the pubic hairs on an obscene sketch of Enjorlas.

“You know, Bousset. We’re in a sexy polyamorous relationship with Musichetta, my sassy Romani girlfriend,” Joly said patiently. “Ohhh,” the crowd said in unison.

“Is he the bald guy always tripping on things?” Jehan asked as he ripped off Courferyrac’s shirt to continue writing Shakespeare sonnets on his chest.

“I think he’s black,” Feuilly said.

“It’s very important for us to be a diverse organization so we make sure to have one (1) black member,” Enjorlas said importantly, his lily-white skin reflecting the light of freedom like an enormous French disco ball. He shot the bottle of Jack Daniel’s in R’s hand a filthy look that launched the cynic into another fit of tears.

“Check your privilege, Apollo!” R said loudly through his sobs. He was always causing disruptions.

Enjorlas choked back tears. He always tried so hard to check his privilege. It was his life’s struggle, as an obnoxiously wealthy, white, Protestant cishet with a college education. Why was R being so mean to him?

“I’m bored!” said Courf loudly, casting a disparaging glance round the room. “Why don’t we ever do anything else as a group, other than sit here watching Enjy shout on table tops and tear R’s self-esteem to shreds? My miniscule attention span needs more excitement and/or Ke$ha sing-alongs.”

Swiping a polishing cloth over his glasses, Combeferre frowned. “What would you rather do?” He sounded genuinely shocked, which, Courfeyrac figured, probably shouldn’t have come as a surprise, considering Combeferre’s general idea of a fun time consisted of watching historical documentaries  on famous moths while his charming but terrible roommate ranted at the microwave (Enjorlas is a terrible cook).

“Let’s go to a club!”

“I’m banned from all the clubs in France,” grunted Bahorel. “Destruction of property, public intoxication and assault.” He tacked off the charges on his fingers.

“We can just turn the ABC into a club,” suggested Courferyac loudly.

Combeferre had resorted to spit-polishing his glasses at this point. “ABC?” he repeated distantly, frowning. “I thought this was the Musain?”

Spluttering into his twelfth bottle of 40-proof liquor that evening, R glanced up in surprise. “Isn’t this the Corinthe?”

“What the hell is the Corinthe? Is that in Poland?” broke in Feuilly.

“I think that’s in France. One day France will be free!” Enjorlas screamed, shaking his fist at invisible monarchs.

“Wait, I thought we were in France?” Jehan asked.

“But France is free,” Combeferre explained for the millionth time as he polished his glasses. He was constantly telling Enjorlas that there was no longer a king of France and in light of that, barricades were no longer a useful method of political campaigning.

Suddenly, the doors of the ABC Cafe/Musain/Corinthe burst open and a tall, freckled young man walked in. It was Marius Pontmercy, sometimes called Moon Moon.

“Hello, close friend and co-conspirator,” Enjorlas called to him.

“Hi guys,” Marius said shyly. He attempted to navigate his way through the empty room, but ended up bumping into a table along the wall. “Ouch. Hey - ”

Jehan perked up immediately from where he had been one-handedly running lazy circles into Courferyac’s crotch to calm him while the other hand continued to scrawl Byronic verses over his bared thigh. “Marius,” he said dreamily, batting his eyelashes, “You look like you’re in love.”

“How the hell do you know that?”

“I am in love with Patria!” exclaimed Enjorlas.

R, looking heartbroken, slunk to another table and took a long sip of whatever he had started drinking. How could he compete with a European landmass? He was totally friendzoned.

“Poland,” hummed Feuilly at his side, by means of condolence. What he meant was: the intensity of your suffering is reminiscent of the struggle Poland, the country, has been going through for centuries. It, too, had its heart split into pieces by France - among other nations. Because he was a very good friend, even though no one really liked him, R understood all of this and nodded sadly.

Returning to Marius:

He had just been ambling aimlessly through the supermarket with his deliciously sassy, exotically beautiful but ultimately friendzoned young neighbour, Eponine, when he was struck by the sudden desire for something cold. At Eponine’s suggestion, he had stumbled into the freezer aisle for a box of popsicles, when a beautiful hand with skin that glimmered as though it were made of ectoplasm reached for the handle at the same time he did.

“Oh,” Marius had said.

“Oh,” said the owner of the hand, her voice like the pealing of bells, if bells were made of the vocal chords of angels and those ridiculously talented kids from Les Choristes. Marius fell instantly in love. He found the other half of his soul in those stunning lilac eyes (much later, after their wedding, it would occur to him to ask her where she had found that, as he’d been looking for it for absolute ages since it had given him the slip one evening on the Métro). “I’m Cosette,” she had said. Next to the frozen waffles, Eponine had gasped in recognition but no one heard her because she was a brunette and Cosette was blonde.

Marius, lost in her ethereal beauty and the amused twist of her soft, red lips that hinted at a charmingly clever and sassy personality, gurgled in return.

Just as he was about to introduce himself, a gruff voice called for Cosette and she gracefully wafted towards the produce section. By the time Marius collected himself from his puddle of attraction on the floor and tried to find her, she was gone.

He said this now, Eponine standing miserably behind him. No one noticed her. It was okay; she was used to rejection. A single tear fell down her face.

“I am agog; I am aghast!” R cried drunkenly. “Is Marius in love at last?”

“We don’t have time for love! This is a revolution!” said Enjorlas. “Especially white, cisgendered heterosexual love. Can’t you fall in love with Feuilly or have a threesome or something for diversity?”

“But Enjy,” Marius whined plaintively, “I don’t even know what we’re revolting against.”

A shadow crossed over Enjorlas’ perfect golden curls. “Tyranny,” he whispered into the darkness.

Courf, sensing another tabletop speech and unable to stand sitting still for so long, jumped up. He was now totally naked and covered in sharpie designs and poetry. His penis was surrounded by Lady Macbeth’s soliloquy with a big heart drawn on the tip. He tied his neon legging around his head. When separated from the neon legging, his entire soul was filled with unexplainable agony.

“I have an idea!” He cried. “Let’s all make out with Lady Gaga blaring in the background.”

Enjorlas blushed pink and turned away dramatically. “We can’t,” he said shyly.

“But why Enjy?” Jehan asked. He was very romantic and wanted to kiss everyone all the time.

“Because,” Enjorlas averted his eyes. “I’ve Never Been Kissed.”

There was a collective gasp. R picked himself up from the floor where he’d been licking the space where Enjorlas had once stood. There were stars in his watery, tragically beautiful blue eyes.

“Neither have I, buddy,” Marius said sympathetically.

“No one cares, Moon Moon!” Combeferre said nastily as he scrubbed his glasses with especial force. He hated Marius because Marius once said something silly and Combeferre, as a smart person who wears glasses, could never forgive him for it.

“I’m just so dedicated to Patria, I’ve never thought about love. I guess I’m just waiting for that special person to embody the people I’m trying to save,” Enjorlas said wistfully. Eponine’s ears perked up. “But alas. Who could ever love someone with such a huge stick stuck up his ass?” This was not a metaphor. Enjorlas was into some kinky shit and had had an immense wooden dildo sitting in his anus for several days. This was okay because as a Greek god incarnate, he didn’t need to poop.

“There, there,” Courferyrac said as he patted Enjorlas on the back.

No one noticed Joly quetching his Hazmat suit through the doors of the café to meet his bald boyfriend and sassy Romani girlfriend in their red Ford pickup outside. No one, that is, except R, who considered himself such a no-one that the point still stands.

He briefly catered to the idea of taking Joly’s cue and fleeing the premises, but the hope fluttering like a dying moth in his chest - and Bahorel’s vice-like grip on his arm - kept him rooted to the spot.

“Er,” he said nervously.

“ALL OF YOU SHUT UP,” cut in Bahorel in his inside-voice. He waited for the noise to die down before carrying on. “R IS ABOUT TO PROFESS HIS UNDYING LOVE TO ENJORLAS - FINALLY, BECAUSE WE’VE ALL SEEN THIS COMING FOREVER - “

“Literally forever,” called Courferyac. “I think there’s even a chapter of the Old Testament devoted to this!” Combeferre muttered “citation needed” under his breath.

Enjorlas had begun to fizz slightly, as though the molecules composing him had given up and begun to dissolve like Pop Rocks. His amazingly cornflower blue eyes found R’s tragically tender ice-blue ones. They stared at one another. R gulped down another three bottles of hard liquor.

“That can’t be,” said Enjorlas finally, as though it settled everything.

Bahorel, who had grown tired of all this talking, grabbed both of them by the crowns of their curly heads, smashed their faces together and commanded through gritted teeth, “KISS.”

Eponine deflated visibly. She should have known better than to get her hopes up again. It’s a common fact of life that all of the good guys are either taken or gay.

R licked his ruggedly handsome lips. “Permets-tu?” He asked. He had a feeling his attempts at sexual advances would go down badly with someone as politically correct as Enjorlas if he didn’t ask first.

“I’m sorry,” said Enjorlas sadly. “I don’t speak French.”

Just as their lips were like, a centimeter away from touching, a rumbling noise echoed throughout the ABC Cafe/Musain/Corinthe.

“They’re so in love that there are fireworks exploding outside,” Jehan sighed dreamily.

He was wrong. Giant boulders fell through the roof, smashing the cafe. Combeferre was crushed as he looked at the sky in confusion. Jehan and Courferyac were smushed mid-coitus. It was how they would have wanted to go. Feuilly whispered “ _Poland_ ” as a particularly large rock hit him. Bahorel tried to smash and have hot, heterosexual sex with several boulders but was tragically crushed in the attempt.

It was only R and Enjorlas left.

“Who even cares about them?” Enjorlas said as he reached in for a sloppy kiss that immediately cured R of his alcoholism and depression. Their mouths had not broken apart when the second round of rocks fell.

 

 

FIN.


End file.
